Amelie LaCroix - Widowmaker
The room was different, but they might as well not have moved her. Smaller space. Just as barren but more cramped, with two chairs on one side of a small table substituting as a makeshift desk, and one chair for Amelie. Angela had resorted to cutting a hole in the middle of the sheet for Widowmaker's head, and then duct taping the sides shut to make a rough tunic that fell slightly above her knees. She was still unclothed otherwise, but now ankles secured to the legs of the chair, wrists to the arms of the chair, and just as confined and helpless. One wall was clearly a one way mirror, and she felt like she was in a badly budgeted crime drama. Did they pick up their interrogation protocol from police holovids?
Amelie had been left there waiting alone for a good half hour, and she was appallingly aware that she hadn't had anything to eat since before her last mission. She had been planning to get a meal afterward, in the down time in Marrakesh. How long ago was that? She couldn't tell if it had only been hours, or if they'd kept her drugged longer. She felt hollow and no little queasy. Whatever drugs they had kept her sedated with hadn't quite worked through her system yet. With her altered biology, using any kind of pharmaceutical on her was risky. She doubted any of them would care over much if she were to have a fatal reaction. Mercy seemed to have lost patience with her, having disappeared as soon as the medical examination was over and having a grim faced Reinhardt move her to this new room and bind her to the chair.
The German had made no attempt at conversation, and had not been gentle. Amelie was sure her cuffs were more than a fraction tighter than before, and she worried about the constriction being enough to cut off the blood flow. Standards of international law for humanitarian treatment in warher sweet ass.
While the treatment was nowhere near as bad as a prisoner of Talon could expect, Amelie knew Overwatch was playing fast and loose with what was legal. They had no oversight. They were already doing more to her than what the Revised Geneva Conventions of 2037 or the post Omnic War Accords of 2065 outlined as acceptable treatment of a prisoner. While she doubted Overwatch would allow obvious, extreme torture, there were a myriad of ways to torment that could be used to break down someone in their power. Having been at the receiving end of Talon's even more extreme interrogation methods, Amelie LaCroix was intimately familiar with all too many of them.
Who would they get to play interrogator? The utter lack of support staff was now obvious to Amelie. She was fairly certain that the three Overwatch agents she'd run into in Morocco were the only ones in this abandoned base with her. They had no real legal authority, and they had actually kidnapped her off the streets of Marrakesh. They might question her regarding her missions for Talon. Those were fait accompli , so whatever intel they were looking for was most likely about the protocols of Talon, as much their bases and their leaders. Perhaps to also gather evidence to what they considered her crimes, to justify how they would punish her. Whatever they pulled from her here would have no weight in a real court of law. However, if they took it on themselves to play judge, jury and executioner, who was to stop them? An unmarked grave was the end destination for more than one Talon agent.
MEANWHILE
"What is the point of questioning her?" Reinhardt downed another foaming beer. His voice was somber thunder, "We know what she's done. We know what she will do if she escapes. We can't simply let her go now. How long do you think we can hold her captive? There is only one thing we can do with her."
"Well, I can think of a couple of other things one can do with a woman as beautiful as Amelie LaCroix." McCree grinned as he lit a cigar, dragging in the cuban smoke, then blowing it past the no smoking sign, "Some real fun things."
Disgust curled Reinhardt's lip. "Her husband thought the world of his wife. Look where it got him."
"We don't know the details. Back in the US of A, we don't presume guilt without evidence and a trail proving guilt. Sounds like you're ready to string her up without even a chance to give her account of what happened."
"She's TALON. What other account is there?" the grizzled warrior growled out.
"That's what we should find out before killing her in cold blood." McCree crossed his legs, boots resting on the table in the commissary.
The mostly stripped room was empty save for him and the older, more weathered giant. Reinhardt was drowning his cares in stein after stein of beer. The table was already crowded with empty mugs.
"I backed you up there in Morrocco, cuz that's what team members do." McCree dragged in another lungful and let it out slow, "But we weren't on a mission. Striking down that girl for simply walking in for a cuppa joe is a might… Well it don't sit right."
"She would kill you in a heartbeat" Reinhardt smashed his stein down on the table with such force all the empty mugs already there jumped and rattled coming down again. "Even if you were sleeping in the bed you just fucked her in."
"Well now," McCree raised an eyebrow, "Won't know that for sure, less we give her the chance."
Reinhardt's good eye narrowed. Angela's arrival interrupted his beginning tirade. Her face was ashen and Reinhardt's manner changed from belligant to concerned in a heartbeat. "Mercy! What is it?"
"Well for one, I just got reamed on the phone from Morrison, for what went down in Marrakesh."
Angela's words were even toned, but her eyes flashed in memory of Jack's biting remarks only moments earlier. He'd apparently gotten an eye and earful of the events from over a dozen video blogs of tourists and locals who'd not only witnessed the incident, but recorded it for posterity. Oh the joys of living in a modern world, where nothing went unrecorded, and everything was published on the world net for everyone to see in moments.
"It wasn't your fault, Angela!" Reinhardt's hearty voice took on a protective note, "This was mydoing! I'll let Jack know I was the one who struck the first blow."
"But I'm the one who decided we'd take Amelie LaCroix. And verdammtI'd do it again!" Angela's own anger came to the fore, "In that head of hers could be the means to save countless lives! To bring down Talon, or at least thwart some of their schemes! I am NOTabout to let this opportunity go to waste!"
"Angela, if you want to tear information out of that murderess, then we will tear it out of her!" Reinhardt's proclamation was emphasized with another pounding of his now empty stein onto the table. "In war, we do what we must. Let me be your shield. I can do this,,, work. It is not something I like to admit, but I can do what what needs to be done, so that you do not have to. Jack can rage at me then, rather than you. It will be like the blowing of air against a brick wall."
Angela was momentarily taken aback by her team mate's grim offer. Was he really volunteering to… No, she must misunderstand what he meant.
"No Reinhardt. It was my call. It is my duty. I will interrogate Amelie LaCroix. And I will do so without staining either of our honor. I am going to do that now. Will you and McCree observe? I feel the more witnesses to her response will prove valuable."
Reinhardt and McCree exchanged glances. As one they agreed, assuring Angela they would be there to back her up.
Amelie LaCroix - Widowmaker
Amelie was surprised to see Dr Ziegler enter the room alone. She was the logical choice of course, if the only other possible Overwatch agents on site were the German warrior or the American cowboy with a dark past. Still, she would not take bets that those same two were not behind the one way glass that was the only decoration in an otherwise bland room.
" Mon Ange Docteur. Are we over our Pique ?" Her words brought Angela's blue eyes to meet her own golden ones, "I did not mean to offend you before."
"I understand you must feel anxious about your situation, Amelie."
Angela Ziegler's voice was it's normal calm, soothing tones. She was working her way slowly into the interrogation, first trying to lull the prisoner a feeling of sympathy.
"I want you to know I'm not your enemy here. I am a neutral party. I just want to understand you better"
"What is there to understand? I am your prisoner. You've kidnapped me. Stripped me naked. Bound me so tightly I fear for the loss of my hands and feet. Starved me."
Amelie shrugged, "Shall I thank you for healing my broken skull after your team mates bashed it in earlier. Thank you docteur, I am grateful to not be dead after the brutal beating I took from your agents. I am sure you will take good care of me should they do more damage."
Angela's lips pressed together, a thin unhappy line. Laid out like that, it sounded very… bad. She could not let the Talon agent take control of the conversation.
"Are you hungry? I am afraid our hospitality is not at it's best. I will have adequate food brought to you after our… talk."
"Call a spade a spade, Mercy." Amelie tilted her head, "This is an interrogation. You were not so circumspect with words earlier. What is it you really want to know."
"When did you become a Talon agent? Did you marry Gerard LaCroix in order to gather intel on OverWatch? Were you Talon from the beginning?" Angela had a set of questions she had meant to address, but her own curious nature won through. She and other Overwatch agents, Gerard's friends and family, had wanted answers for so many years.
"Was I… ?" Amelie's laugh was hard enough to bring tears to her eyes, " Mon ange … I was, oh so many years ago, nothing more than what I appeared to be. A ballerina. A wife. A waste of time and space existing only for the support and pleasure of others. Until Talon took me, and made me into something far more useful."
Angela kept a calm face, watching the other woman's gaze drift to the right in reverie.
"How did they make you useful?"
"By breaking me of course. I was no one, and nothing. They broke that nothingness down, and remade me from the pieces. Faster. Stronger. Better in all ways."
"A killer?" Angela held her breath after her question, not sure if it was too soon.
"Useful." Amelie dismissed the attempt to have her damn herself with a confession to her kills. Overwatch would have to work harder than that.
"How did Talon break you?" Angela kept her eyes on Amelie, carefully not glancing at the one way glass. McCree and Reinhardt were observing. Were they seeing what she was seeing? Amelie was worrying one wrist in it's cuff. She didn't seem to notice what she was doing. It was obvious she was thinking about something that made her want to escape.
"I don't wish to talk of it." Amelie's voice had gone flat. "It is of no consequence."
"How can you say that?" Angela probed, sensing a sore spot "You say they brokeyou. How can you work for an organization that did that to you?"
"Because… " Amelie shrugged a shoulder. "Because that is who I am now. I am no longer broken. I am remade now. Do you not appreciate what Talon has done? The perfection they have achieved? The medical wonder of my physiology alone justifies my existence."
"Do you need to justify your existence?" Angela's voice had turned softer, "Don't you deserve to just exist?"
"No." Amelie's voice was curt. "I exist on Talon's sufferance. When that sufferance is at an end, so shall I be."
Amelie didn't want to play this game anymore. The doctor was boring her now. She wanted to get up out of the uncomfortable chair they had her strapped into and leave. This wasn't amusing in any way. She wanted to LEAVE.
But she couldn't.
So she put her boredom into her face and forbeared.
The questions after that were endless. She admitted nothing. Noncommittal replies. It felt like hours dragged into infinity. Where was this? Did she know this person? Who gave her orders? Was she at this event? How was she rewarded…
Rewarded? Finally a question she could answer.
"My reward, mon ange ? I am my reward."
" Was … What do you mean by that?" Angela shook herself a little. She had gone on auto pilot for a while, lost in the frustrating, monotonous drone of non-answers, till this unexpected deviation occurred.
"You wouldn't understand, mon ange ." Amelie yawned. She was so tired. "Can we not call it a day? S'il vous plaît? Or are we in the sleep deprivation portion of our dance? The food deprivation train has already left the station, and yet I have a pressing need to relieve myself. Shall I soil myself here? Or do you have somewhere more convenient for such messes?"
Jarred, Angela looked blankly at the Talon agent. That was NOT the situation! She'd merely lost track of time in the repetition of LaCroix's " I do not know" and " The answer escapes me" and the occasional, "Do you really expect me to answer that?"
Face unhappy, Angela admitted defeat to herself, if not to the Talon agent.
"Reinhardt will escort you to a bathing facility. You can take care of your needs there."
"Will he watch?" Amelie's query was deadpan, but her eyes lit with a small spark of amusement as the Swiss Doctor grimaced.
"Why can't you be more cooperative, Amelie?!" Angela ground out, near the end of her fuse. So far the Talon agent had given them zero useful information, and from her attitude, she was giving zero fucks as well. Nothing so far had justified the risk Overwatch was taking by having her prisoner, and Angela was losing patience.
Amelie's eyes sharpened on the doctor's look of vexation.
"Truly? You want to know why? Because I like being ALIVE, Doctor Ziegler." her voice shook a little as it rose. She was shaking a little as well. She was near her limit too.
"You have condemned me to death already, and right now your execution method appears to be death by boredom! Honestly, I have absolutely no reason whatsoever to help you or Overwatch in any way, shape or form! Dieu, even Talon dangled some small scraps above my cage, to encourage me to obey!"
The French woman slumped in her chair, her breathing slowing as she regained her composure.
"I thought Talon had fixed you so that you felt no emotion. Like a spider." Angela commented, trying to avoid the upset feelings Amelie was stirring in her. Your modifications are said to slow your heart rate and make you the perfect cold hearted killer."
"Really? And you are supposed to be a medical doctor?" Amelie's laugh was like a low growl.
"Poetry is not science, mon ange . The number of beats per moment of your heart does not control your feelings. The heat of your body does not affect your aim. And nobody is perfect, ma tres chère. Not even me"
They stared at each other, celestial blue eyes searching amber gold. Their silent battle of wills broken by Reinhardt entering the room with McCree.
"I'll take her to the womens' facilities." Reinhardt's voice was gruff. He reached to loosen the cuffs on Amelie's ankles and wrists, and helped her to stand.
A short yelp of pain later, and Amelie was on the ground rubbing at her ankles frantically. The loss of circulation had first made her feet go numb, but now they were like a beehive of pain. Her hands were little better, but she didn't need to walk on her hands. Then Angela was there, examining and tutting her tongue in concern.
"Reinhardt! How tightly did you bind her? I'm going to have to use a healing patch! You stupid, stupid girl! Why didn't tell me your bonds were too tight? Do you WANT to lose a limb?" Angela scolded harshly.
"I did tell you, you stupid vache suisse! " Amelie hissed in pain, trying not to scream instead, "You were not listening to what I was saying. You didn't want to hear thatpart of what I was telling you. Your kind never wants to listen to the parts that would put you or Overwatch in a bad light. That is why Overwatch fell in the first place. You ignored the bad, focused on the good, and the world around you tore you down because everyone else could see the rot for what it was."
Then she gasped in relief as the healing from a micro pack Angela had snatched from one of her pockets bathed the stricken woman's hands and feet in a soft golden glow.
" Je vous remercie," Amelie's voice was almost a whisper, "Thank you. I didn't mean to call you a swiss cow. Just forget I said anything at all."
Troubled, Angela helped the Talon agent to stand. Looking past the assassin to the german behind her, Angela nodded. The over muscled giant scooped Amelie up like a small child, and carried her to the nearest females facility. It was an interior bathroom, so he wasn't concerned she could escape, with him at the only entrance.
"Go. Take care of your business." He set her down and pushed her through the door, closing it behind her.
Taking a sentry's stance, Reinhardt stood guard at the door.
"So, old man. Does the account matter after all?" McCree had ground out his last cigar while watching the interrogation hours ago. But he still had some hand rolled cigarettes, and was considered one unlit one before sighing and stashing it away again. All things in moderation.
"She could be lying." Reinhardt's answer was short, but his heart wasn't behind the words. "There was so much rumor and disinformation going on about what happened when Talon first kidnapped her, then after Gerard was… gone. We all thought Amelie was dead as well, a victim of a double murder. Then she resurfaced, an obvious Talon agent. What else were we supposed to think?"
"Yeah. What else?" McCree sauntered away, to meet with Angela and go over the observations he'd made watching the interrogation. They might not know much more about Talon's bases or plans, but he reckoned they'd learned at least a few interesting facts. Later on, he still had promises to keep.
to be continued